1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates, in general, to carpet cleaning apparatus and, more specifically, to carpet cleaning apparatus which dispense a cleaning fluid onto a surface to be cleaned and utilize vacuum to extract the dirty solution from the surface.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Various cleaning apparatus have been devised to clean carpets, rugs and the like. A typical carpet cleaning device is in the form of a housing containing two liquid storage tanks; one for a cleaning solution or chemical and another for waste or dirty liquid extracted from the carpet under vacuum pressure. The cleaning solution is applied to the surface through a movable applicator or wand. Then, a vacuum is applied through the wand to extract dirty liquid from the carpet as the wand is moved along the carpet. The dirty or waste liquid is then transmitted by the vacuum pressure to the dirty liquid storage tank in the housing.
In large scale or commercial cleaning operations, the liquid storage housing is typically mounted in a vehicle, such as a truck. The liquid application and vacuum lines extend from the truck mounted vacuum source and liquid storage tanks to the area to be cleaned.
In order to increase the vacuum pressure for large scale applications, such cleaning apparatus have been constructed with multiple, co-axially arranged vacuum pumps or motors. This enables greater amounts of dirty liquid to be extracted from a carpet. Such devices have also been constructed with one vacuum pump or motor mounted in a mobile housing, which is remotely movable with respect to the main vacuum source and truck mounted liquid storage housing, with the remote unit serving as the dirty liquid storage tank. However, the remote liquid storage tank must be emptied numerous times during large scale cleaning operations which increases the time required to clean a large area.
Thus, it would be desirable to provide a water vacuum extraction apparatus which is capable of providing increased vacuum extraction pressure to simplify carpet cleaning operations. It would also be desirable to provide a vehicle mounted vacuum extraction apparatus having a remotely located, mobile, auxilliary vacuum source and waste liquid storage tank with automatic discharge of waste liquid from the remotely mobile storage tank to a main waste liquid storage tank mounted on the vehicle.